on Rittenheim's face.

"You go? So goes ever-ything from me--love and fr-riendship--and even
hope," he added, in a whisper. Then, as Sydney looked at him curiously,
"Let me bring Yonny for you."

Sydney kissed a "good-by" upon the fat hand of the baby, now hooded for
her journey to the Baron's, and murmured to Melissa,--

"You will think of what I said? You will be quite sure?"

She turned and surrendered her slender, booted foot to the Baron's
palm, and was tossed deftly into the saddle. She had no realization of
the thrill that went through him at the touch; he had no notion of the
admiration that his dexterity roused in her.

"I came by a path through the woods and tore down some of Bud's fence.
Will you go with me and put it up? It is only a little way."

Von Rittenheim was delighted at the prolongation of his happiness. To
walk with his hand on her horse's neck; to do her a trifling service!
It was heaven!

"You will come soon to Oakwood, won't you? Grandmother is eager to see
you, and we are expecting some guests from New York on this afternoon's
train--the Wendells; I want them to know you."

The words were as sweet as the voice, and he repeated them in a whisper
as he put together the rails of Bud's fence after Johnny's surmounting
heels had cleared them.

Then the chill swept around his heart again. It did seem to him as if
he were losing everything that made life good. In the old country he
had yielded up the little that was left after happiness had been stolen
from him. Here he had yearned for friendship, and it had played him a
scurvy trick; he had begun to see a faint glimmer of hope at the end of
the black cavern--just a point of light that gave promise of a land of
sun and cheer beyond. And now he felt that he had no right to travel
towards that point of light, to strive to reach it and make that land
his own, while shame hung over him, and black and bitter thoughts
filled his heart.

His was a simple nature, von Rittenheim's,--one that yielded easily to
the common thralls of love and life. He should have been the happy head
of a family with the daily round of duties on a large estate to occupy
his thoughts. It was one of the freaks of fate that the kindly
outpourings of his heart always had been flung back at him. Unkind
chance had done her best to ruin a gentle and trusting disposition.

He was musing on his wrongs as he tramped along the path between Bud's
cabin and his own. His high-flung